Troy (film)

Troy is a 2004 epic historical war film directed by Wolfgang Petersen and written by David Benioff. Produced by units in Malta, Mexico and Britain's Shepperton Studios, the film features an ensemble cast led by Brad Pitt, Eric Bana, Sean Bean, Brian Cox, Brendan Gleeson and Orlando Bloom. It is loosely based on Homer's Iliad in its narration of the entire story of the decade-long Trojan War—condensed into little more than a couple of weeks, rather than just the quarrel between Achilles and Agamemnon in the ninth year. Achilles leads his Myrmidons along with the rest of the Greek army invading the historical city of Troy, defended by Hector's Trojan army. The end of the film (the sack of Troy) is not taken from the Iliad, but rather from Quintus Smyrnaeus's Posthomerica, as the Iliad concludes with Hector's death and funeral.

Troy made over $497 million worldwide, making it the 60th highest-grossing film at the time of its release. However, it received mixed reviews, with critics praising its entertainment value and the performances of Pitt and Bana  while criticizing its story, which was deemed unfaithful to the Iliad. It received a nomination for Best Costume Design at the 77th Academy Awards and was the eighth highest-grossing film of 2004.

Plot
In 1184 BC, King Agamemnon unites the Greek kingdoms. Achilles, a heroic warrior, fights for Agamemnon but despises his tyrannical rule. Meanwhile, Prince Hector of Troy and his brother Paris negotiate a peace treaty with Menelaus, King of Sparta. Paris begins an affair with Menelaus's wife, Queen Helen, and he smuggles her aboard his home-bound vessel. Hector, angry at first, reluctantly agrees to bring Helen to Troy. Angered, Menelaus meets Agamemnon, his elder brother, and asks him to help take Troy. Agamemnon agrees, as conquering Troy would give him control of the Aegean Sea. Agamemnon sends Odysseus, King of Ithaca, to persuade Achilles to join them.

In Troy, King Priam welcomes Helen when Hector and Paris return home, and decides to prepare for war. The Greeks eventually invade with 50,000 men and take the Trojan beach, thanks largely to Achilles and his Myrmidons clearing out the Trojan vanguard. Achilles has the temple of Apollo sacked, and claims Briseis — a priestess and the cousin of Paris and Hector — as a prisoner. He is enraged when Agamemnon spitefully takes her from him, and decides that he will not aid Agamemnon in the siege. The Trojans meanwhile debate on how best to deal with the Greek invasion. General Glaucus puts his trust in the walls of Troy and the strength of their army while others argue for diplomacy. Paris announces his intention to challenge Menelaus for the right to Helen. The Trojan and Greek armies meet outside of Troy. During a parlay, Paris offers to personally duel Menelaus in exchange for Helen and the city being spared. Agamemnon, intending to take the city regardless, accepts. Menelaus wounds Paris and almost kills him, but is himself killed by Hector, violating the duel. An enraged Agamemnon orders the Greeks to crush the Trojan army. The ensuing battle however is a disaster for the Greeks; Hector personally kills Ajax, and thousands of Greek soldiers perish against Troy's highly disciplined and battle-tested army supported by archers on the city walls. With the Greek casualties rapidly mounting, Agamemnon is forced into retreat but remains opposed to reconciling with Achilles. He gives Briseis to the Greek soldiers for their amusement, but Achilles saves her. Later that night, Briseis sneaks into Achilles's quarters intent on killing him; her feelings betray her, she yields to Achilles and they become lovers. Achilles then resolves to leave Troy, much to the dismay of Patroclus, his cousin and protégé.

Despite Hector's objections, Priam orders him to attack the Greeks. Hector duels a man he believes to be Achilles and kills him, only to discover it was actually Patroclus. Distraught, both armies agree to stop fighting for the day. Achilles is informed of his cousin's death and vows revenge. Wary of Achilles, Hector shows his wife Andromache a secret tunnel beneath Troy. Should he die and the city fall, he instructs her to take their child and any survivors out of the city to Mount Ida.

The next day, Achilles arrives outside Troy and challenges Hector. The two duel until Hector is killed, and Achilles vengefully drags his corpse back to the Trojan beach in full view of the Trojan spectators, resolving to desecrate the prince's body so that he will eternally suffer in the afterlife. Priam sneaks into the camp and implores Achilles to return Hector's body for a proper funeral. Ashamed of his actions, Achilles agrees and allows Briseis to return to Troy with Priam, promising a twelve day truce so that Hector's funeral rites may be held in peace. He also orders his men to return home without him.

Agamemnon declares that he will take Troy regardless of the cost. Concerned, Odysseus concocts a plan to infiltrate the city: he has the Greeks build a gigantic wooden horse as a peace offering and abandon the Trojan beach, hiding their ships in a nearby cove. Priam orders the horse be brought into the city. That night, Greeks hiding inside the horse emerge and open the city gates for the Greek army, commencing the Sack of Troy. The soldiers of Troy rouse themselves and attempt to defend the city but they are overwhelmed and massacred while the civilians are taken prisoner or butchered.

As the Greeks sack the lower city, Andromache and Helen guide the Trojans to safety through the tunnel, Paris gives the Sword of Troy to Aeneas, instructing him to protect the Trojans and find them a new home. As the Greeks penetrate the palace grounds Glaucus leads the remaining Trojans in a valiant last stand. The Trojans kill many Greeks but are ultimately slain, with Glaucus being killed by Odysseus in single combat. Agamemnon kills Priam and captures Briseis, who then kills Agamemnon. Achilles fights his way through the city and reunites with Briseis. Paris, seeking to avenge his brother, shoots an arrow through Achilles's heel and then several into his body. Achilles bids farewell to Briseis, and watches her flee with Paris before dying.

In the aftermath, Troy is finally taken by the Greeks and a funeral is held for Achilles, where Odysseus personally cremates his body.

Production
The city of Troy was built on the Mediterranean island of Malta at Fort Ricasoli from April to June 2003. Other important scenes were shot in Mellieħa, a small town in the north of Malta, and on the small island of Comino. The outer walls of Troy were built and filmed in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. Film production was disrupted for a period after Hurricane Marty affected filming areas. Pitt also suffered an injury to his Achilles tendon during filming which caused the production to delay for several weeks.

The role of Briseis was initially offered to Bollywood actress Aishwarya Rai, but she turned it down because she was not comfortable doing the lovemaking scenes that were included. The role eventually went to Rose Byrne.

Music
Composer Gabriel Yared originally worked on the score for Troy for over a year, having been hired by the director, Wolfgang Petersen. Tanja Carovska provided vocals on various portions of the music, as she later would on composer James Horner's version of the soundtrack. However, the reactions at test screenings which used an incomplete version of the score were negative, and in less than a day Yared was off the project without a chance to fix or change his music. James Horner composed a replacement score in about four weeks. He used Carovska's vocals again and also included traditional Eastern Mediterranean music and brass instruments. Horner also collaborated with American singer-songwriter Josh Groban and lyricist Cynthia Weil to write an original song for the film's end credits. The product of this collaboration, "Remember Me", was performed by Groban with additional vocals by Carovska.

The soundtrack for the film was released on May 11, 2004, through Reprise Records.

Director's cut
Troy: Director's Cut was screened at the 57th Berlin International Film Festival on February 17, 2007, and received a limited release in Germany in April 2007. Warner Home Video reportedly spent more than $1 million for the director's cut, which includes "at least 1,000 new cuts" or almost 30 minutes of extra footage (with a new running time of 196 minutes). The DVD was released on September 18, 2007, in the US. The score of the film was changed dramatically, with many of the female vocals being cut. An addition to the music is the use of Danny Elfman's theme for Planet of the Apes during the pivotal fight between Hector and Achilles in front of the Gates of Troy. Josh Groban's song was removed from the end credits as well.

Various shots were recut and extended. For instance, the love scene between Helen and Paris was reframed to include more nudity of Diane Kruger. The love scene between Achilles and Briseis is also extended. Only one scene was removed: the scene where Helen tends to the wound of Paris is taken out. The battle scenes were also extended, depicting more violence and gore, including much more of Ajax's bloody rampage on the Trojans during the initial attack by the Greek army and his duel with Hector. Perhaps most significant was the sack of Troy, barely present in the theatrical cut, but shown more fully here, depicting the Greek soldiers raping women and murdering babies. Characters were provided more time to develop, specifically Priam and Odysseus, the latter being given a humorous introduction scene. More emphasis is given to the internal conflict in Troy between the priests, who believe in omens and signs from the gods to determine the outcome of the war, and military commanders, who believe in practical battle strategies to achieve victory, mainly between Trevor Eve and James Cosmo. Lastly, bookend scenes were added: the beginning being a soldier's dog finding its dead master and the end including a sequence where the few surviving Trojans escape to Mount Ida.

There are frequent differences between the Iliad and Troy, most notably relating to the final fates of Paris, Helen, Agamemnon, Achilles and Menelaus. In one of the commentary sequences, the film's writer, David Benioff, said that when it came to deciding whether to follow the Iliad or to do what was best for the film, they always did what seemed best for the film. "I think there are maybe two or three lines in the script that quote Homer," Benioff says. "Any more than that wouldn't have been possible."

Home media
Troy was released on DVD and VHS on January 4, 2005. The director's cut was released on Blu-ray, HD DVD, and DVD on September 18, 2007. The director's cut is the only edition of the film available on Blu-ray globally, however there is a Czech Blu-ray release of the theatrical cut.

Box office
Troy grossed $133.4 million in the United States and Canada, and $364 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $497.4 million, making the film one of the highest grossing films of 2004, alongside The Passion of the Christ, Spider-Man 2 and Shrek 2. When the film was completed, total production costs were approximately $185 million, making Troy one of the most expensive films produced at that time. It was screened out of competition at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival.

The film made $46.9 million in its opening weekend, topping the box office, then $23.9 million in its second weekend falling to second.

Critical response
On Rotten Tomatoes, Troy holds an approval rating of 53% based on 229 reviews, with an average rating of 6.00/10. The site's critics consensus reads: "A brawny, entertaining spectacle, but lacking emotional resonance." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 56 out of 100, based on 43 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B" on an A+ to F scale.

Roger Ebert rated the film two out of four stars, saying: "Pitt is modern, nuanced, introspective; he brings complexity to a role where it is not required." IGN critics Christopher Monfette and Cindy White praised the director's cut as superior to the early version, evaluating it with eight stars out of ten.

Peter O'Toole, who played Priam, spoke negatively of the film during an appearance at the Savannah Film Festival, stating he walked out of the film fifteen minutes into a screening, and criticized the director, slamming him as "a clown". Years later, Brad Pitt expressed disappointment with the film, saying: "I had to do Troy because [...] I pulled out of another movie and then had to do something for the studio. So I was put in Troy. It wasn't painful, but I realized that the way that movie was being told was not how I wanted it to be. I made my own mistakes in it. What am I trying to say about Troy? I could not get out of the middle of the frame. It was driving me crazy. I'd become spoiled working with David Fincher. It's no slight on Wolfgang Petersen. Das Boot is one of the all-time great films. But somewhere in it, Troy became a commercial kind of thing. Every shot was like, 'Here's the hero!' There was no mystery."

Some have criticized screenwriter David Benioff, who later become one of the creators of the fantasy TV series Game of Thrones, for taking on too much material by covering the complete and lengthy chronology of the Trojan War, but he claimed he was aware of this challenge. He is quoted addressing this rather bluntly in an article by actor David Goldsmith in the journal Creative Screenwriting: "The script covers the Trojan War in its entirety, whereas Iliad is only one fragment of it. I didn't want to have little titles saying, 'Flash forward nine years.' It would have made it more faithful to the source material, but it wouldn't have been effective for the movie. I always followed the route that I thought was better for the movie; if that meant that I was cheating on Homer then so be it."